Cold Metal
by aqaws321
Summary: Donnie takes arresting Mac a little too far. Riley is more than happy to wipe the smug grin off of his face. Set during 1x10, "Pliers."
1. Chapter 1

**This story features a police officer abusing his power. Please note that I in no way believe that this reflects the actions of all or even a majority of police officers. Are there officers out there that are bad people and abuse their power? Yes. But there are bad people in every profession, and the rest of that profession shouldn't be judged by the actions of a few.**

 **That said, please enjoy!**

 **Warnings: Implied/referenced off-screen torture, bullying, violence. Nothing over a T and nothing sexual. Let me know if there's anything else you want me to tag.**

 **Thanks to MissCrazyWriter321 over on AO3 for their help and feedback!**

* * *

Mac sits quietly in the back of the patrol car, a little more uneasy than he'd care to admit at the moment. He and Jack had been sent in different squad cars, and being trapped alone with his middle-through-high-school bully is more than a little nerve-wracking. That, and the way Donnie had twisted his arm without remorse as Mac was being forced into the backseat of the car, was enough to put the young man on the edge of his seat.

It's started raining again, and the roads are slick. Donnie slows down, and, at first, Mac thinks that he was just being cautious. However, when the car comes to a complete stop, lights switching off and pulling over on the side of the road, he knows that something is wrong. The older man hopped out of the car, a tight, waterproof jacket pulled tightly around him, and yanked open Mac's door.

The younger man squints through the sudden onslaught of rain and wind said blurts, suddenly certain that what's about to happen won't be good for his health in the slightest, "Donnie-"

He's cut off as Donnie yanks him out into the rain, his firm grasp on Mac's arm- which is still handcuffed to the other behind him- the only thing keeping Mac from slipping on the wet pavement. Still keeping a firm grip on Mac, Donnie uses his other hand to grab a flashlight from his belt and begins pushing- shoving, more like- Mac forward.

The rain is coming down in torrents, with the only light the faint glow of Donnie's torch. It makes the scene that much more ominous, and Mac, in the part of his mind that's constantly in exasperation and full of how-is-this-my-life thoughts, wonders why the situations he gets himself in are always so dramatic.

Donnie pushes Mac forward, towards the forest. Suddenly wary- more than he already is, at least- Mac plants his feet in an attempt to stop moving, but starts to skid across the already slippery gravel. Donnie has little patience, and this aggravates him even more than Mac's presence. He shoves the younger man towards the ground, releasing his grip.

Mac hits the ground hard. He's left gasping, stunned, as his breath is knocked from him. He narrows his eyes against the cutting rain as he peers up at Donnie. "What're- what're you doing?" He wheezes, fighting for breath.

Donnie sneers down at him. "You think you and your friend can come here and embarrass me in front of the other officers like that?"

He reaches down and hauls Mac up by the collar of his jacket, having to tightly grip the material as it's soaked by the downpour. "I've got something to tell you, Angus. You don't get to come back here and act like you're better than us just because you went to some fancy college in California or wherever."

Mac stares at the older man, his mind whirling. Is Donnie really doing this?

He's pulled from his thoughts by a painful punch to his stomach. Donnie releases him, letting him drop to the muddy ground. Mac frantically tries to draw air into his lungs as Donnie leans over him. "And here I thought you remembered our little agreement in school- when I talk, you listen."

He kicks Mac, and the younger man curls up, trying desperately to shelter his ribs, which have started to throb painfully in a way that's only familiar to those that've cracked ribs before. His attempts to protect himself are hampered by his hands, though, which are still painfully restrained behind him.

Donnie keeps talking, punctuating his words with kicks. "We had this all worked out, and then, when you left, I thought I wouldn't have to see the town disappointment anymore. But no, here you are. You can't do anything right, can you?"

Mac stops focusing on his words after that. Everything becomes a haze of pain and darkness and cold. He's not sure how much time has passed, but it feels as though it's been an eternity. His instincts kick in. He's been on more than one mission where he's been captured and tortured for information, and this one is no different. He grits his teeth and forced out, through the pain, "Not gonna tell you anything."

The man above him pauses, a heavy silence building between the two before he hauls the younger man up and slams him against the side of something hard- something that feels strangely like the side of a car. "What did you say?"

Mac doggedly shakes his head. He doesn't know what this guy wants, but he isn't going to give it to him. There's a moment of silence, and then the younger man is slammed against the hard surface again. He gags as the pain hit him again. He's pretty sure he's got a concussion as well as cracked, if not broken, ribs and countless others bruises and scrapes. His hands, having been slammed between him and a hard surface more than once now, are also aching.

"I said, what did you say, _Angus_?"

Mac stiffens. They know his name. They have to have other information on him. He can't give in, but he has to know what else they might have to use against him. _Who_ they might have to use against him. "Said 'm not gonna tell you anything."

The man scoffs. "Useless. You're just a disappointment, you know? Can't do anything right. That's why your dad left."

Mac's already pretty out of it, but those words cut through the haze of pain that's drowning him. He struggles against his captor's grip, snarling, "You don't know anything about that-"

A heavy fist collides with his face, snapping his head to the side and silencing him. "Oh yeah? Still sensitive about Daddy, huh, Angus? Still defensive about him just up and leaving you after Mommy died?"

The tone is mocking, cruel, and Mac can't take it. He struggles again, desperately trying to somehow land a blow on the man pinning him against the hard surface behind him. Despite his anger-fueled surge of strength, though, he's too weakened by pain to succeed, and all that he's been able to do is tire himself out more.

That isn't going to stop him, though, not by a long shot. He keeps fighting until another fist plants itself firmly in his stomach, and with that Mac feels one of his ribs come dangerously close to breaking. He tries to back away from the man in front of him, escape the only thing on his mind at this point, but his captor has a firm grip on the younger man and isn't anywhere near close to letting go. Dimly, through the rain that's still pouring down on them, Mac sees a fist come up, and braces for the impact. As he does so, it registers- just barely, but that just barely is enough- that a bright light has suddenly cuts through the dark.

Mac hears a familiar voice. Jack, he thinks, fighting through the haze. A warm pair of hands grab him, helping him to the ground, and shouting fills the air. He looks up at Jack, his friend's worried face filling his vision. "Didn't tell them anything, Jack."

Jack frowns, confused. Mac wonders if the older man had even understood him, considering the state Mac's in. He tries again. "Didn't tell them- didn't-"

Jack cuts him off as he began to struggle to force the sentence out. The older man's vision has cleared, and he looks very, very angry. "Okay, buddy. I got you. It's okay."

Mac nods, the motion barely there. Jack's here. He'll take care of the situation, just like always. Mac's eyes slip closed, and he- finally, blissfully- lets the darkness that's been resting at the edges of his vision take over.

* * *

 **Prompted by Ciel-Scamander. Hope I included enough Mac whump for both of us, dear :).**


	2. Chapter 2

**i'm... blown away by the support this story received? i think that's easily the biggest response i've ever gotten in the first 24 hours. thank yall so much and i hope you enjoy the rest of this!**

* * *

Of all the things that Jack has never wanted to see, the sight of his youngest friend being beaten in the pouring rain was almost at the top of his list. Officer Aaron Peters, who is driving- and who helped clear up Jack and Mac's innocence in about five minutes once he and Jack had reached the station- pulls the car to a stop and is slamming his door closed just a few seconds behind Jack.

Jack, who is running towards the two men just a few yards away with murder in his eyes.

Jack punches Sandoz in the jaw, the force pushing the younger man away from Mac. Then Jack's turning, quick as he can, and grabbing Mac as he starts to fall to the ground. The blond is bruised everywhere that's visible, and he's sporting a rapidly developing black eye, and his breaths are coming disturbingly fast. His blond hair, muddy and sopping wet from the still-falling rain, hangs limply in his face.

The kid blinks up at Jack, his gaze unfocused. He mutters a few words, confusion and panic written all over his face, but all Jack's able to make out is, "Didn't tell... anything," before breaking off. Jack frowns, and Mac tries to repeat himself, but begins to struggle. He manages to get out, "Didn't tell them," again, and Jack finally understands. A cold anger floods through him. The conditions, combined with the fact that he was being beaten, must've triggered some kind of flashback for the kid.

Looking down at Mac, he finds that he's finally passed out. Jack doesn't really want to leave him, even for a moment, but there's something he needs to do. Easing the unconscious kid down against the car, Jack stands. He crosses the ground to where the two officers are yelling at each other, his face murderous, and punched Donnie Sandoz in the face with all the anger of someone who's family has been attacked behind the punch.

Donnie drops like a rock, unconscious.

Peters stares for a moment, then nods. "I was just about a second away from doing that myself."

Jack doesn't respond. He bends down and begins to go through the unconscious cop's belt, smiling slightly as he finds what he was looking for. Quickly crossing across the ground to where Mac is lying, he gently turns the blond until he can get at his hands, which are still tightly handcuffed behind his back. Mac lets out an almost-silent breath as his hands fall to his sides, relief from the pain softening the edges of his face even in unconsciousness.

Jack turns to Peters. "I need to get him to a doctor right away."

Peters nods, tossing him a set of keys. "These are for my car. There's a doctor at the station; they didn't want to drive in the storm. They should still be there when you get back. I'll take care of Sandoz."

Jack nods back. "Thanks."

He carefully picks up Mac and carries him to the squad car, deciding to sit him in the front passenger seat so that he can talk him down from whatever scenario the kid thinks he's in if he wakes up. As Jack sest Mac's wrists in his lap after buckling him in, he notes the the way the skin is raw and bleeding from the tightness of the handcuffs.

He wishes he had punched Sandoz harder.

Jack pushes the thought away. There'll be time for regrets later. Right now he needs to get Mac back to the station as fast as possible.

* * *

Jack doesn't remember much of the ride home, only that he turns on the sirens, breaks a couple traffic laws, and listens to Mac wheeze painfully for twenty agonizing minutes before they reach the police station. When he screeches to a stop in front of the building, there's an ambulance and a team of paramedics there waiting for him, and he spares a moment to be thankful for Peters' quick thinking.

The paramedics waiting by the ambulance don't even wait for Jack to exit the car, instead rushing to Mac's side and wrenching the door open as soon as Jack's thrown the vehicle into park. Two paramedics maneuver Mac gently onto a gurney and into the back of the ambulance as another paramedic starts to talk to Jack, gathering the details of what's happened.

As they talk, both Jack and the paramedic are climbing into the back of the ambulance with Mac, and Jack's speech falters as he glances at his still friend. The paramedic taps Jack on the shoulder, her gaze soft and understanding. "Is that everything, sir?"

Jack tears his gaze from Mac. "Uh, yeah. He, uh, sedatives never have a normal effect on him. He always wakes up early."

The paramedic nods, turning to her coworkers that have already started to work on Mac. Jack watches, his heartbeat pounding in his ears. He'd seen his friend unconscious, even wounded badly, more times than he cares to remember, but this isn't a mission, isn't the army. This is something else, something completely different.

It's revenge and grudges and pettiness, bad childhoods and unfaithful family members, unfounded guilt and roots of self-doubt. This isn't something Jack can always protect Mac against, not when it's rooted in the past.

Jack doesn't remember much of the ambulance ride, either.

* * *

Mac wakes to bright lights and pain.

He tries to sit up, only to feel firm hands pushing him back down. Mac squints through the haze of pain that blurs his vision to find Jack looking down at him with worry in his eyes. "How are you feeling, buddy?"

Mac coughs as he begins to reply, his throat scratchy and dry. Jack turns and grabs a cup of water from the nearby table and helps Mac sit up enough to sip at the water, then lies the younger man back down. Mac tries again. "Like a truck hit me. What happened?"

Jack frowns, his knuckles going white from clutching the sheets on Mac's bed so hard. "What do you remember about the car ride back to the station with Donnie?"

Mac thinks back for a moment- and then it comes crashing back to him. The ride, the unannounced stop, Donnie- the beating. "Oh."

Jack noda, sitting down in a chair that's by the bed. "Yeah. Oh."

Mac swallows against the memory of the pain, which is now, he now realizes, nothing compared to what it had been- last night? The day before? How much time has he lost? Suddenly panicked, he turns to Jack, who realizes what the younger man is about to ask when he sees the panic in Mac's eyes. "It's ten am. We found you last night. You've been out for a little over ten hours."

Mac nods, sinking back against his pillows. "Thanks," he rasps. "Didn't want to find out that three days had passed, or something. Hey, did the doctors say when-"

Jack cuts him off. You need to stay in a hospital for two more days."

Mac deflates, disappointed at the prospect of two more boring days spent in a bed. He's distracted from his situation, though, by Jack's current expression. Namely, one of anger. "Jack? You okay?"

The older man runs a hand through his hair. "Just- furious with the situation. Kind of wish I could make Sandoz sorry for this."

Mac shrugs. "He's going to get kicked off the force, right?"

Jack nods. "Oh yeah. He's going to go to jail for the maximum sentence, too."

Mac shrugs again. "That's going to hurt him pretty much anyways."

Jack opens his mouth to say something before glancing down at his phone. "Bozer wants to show us something. Hold on."

He answers a video call from Bozer that lights up the screen and holds the phone so that both he and Mac can easily see it.

Bozer is obviously standing outside the interrogation room, behind the one-way mirror. Riley, however, is sitting in a chair by Peters, across the table from Donnie. The young woman looks furious, an expression that's rarely seen on her. Peters is talking. "Do you have any idea how disappointed and embarrassed this department is, that _I_ am, in you?"

Donnie asks, sullenly, "How did you even find me?"

The older man scowls back, his tone short and furious as he answers, "We called your radio when you weren't arriving here in a normal amount of time, and when you didn't answer, we tracked your GPS. And then," his tone rises, "We get to where you are and find you beating the life out of this kid. What is wrong with you?"

Donnie isn't phased by the older man. "He's just a screw-up, and he gets to come back here, acting so high and mighty? No-"

Riley shoots to her feet, slamming her hands down on the metal table. "Shut up."

Donnie stares at her, taken by surprise. Riley doesn't even pause before continuing. "You have no grounds to talk about Mac like that. None. I've seen him take down men twice his size with nothing but a tarp. He's saved countless lives. He worked in the army disarming bombs _while being shot at_ , and he did it when he was _eighteen_. Now he's working for an agency that saves lives and stops terrorists. _Mac_ does that without using a gun.

"So you know what? You can take all this idiotic crap that you're spewing and shove it, you got it? Because Mac is worth a hundred of you, any day."

Riley pushes back from the table, stalking to the door and throwing back over her shoulder, "I'm done."

Jack and Mac stare at each other for a minute before breaking out into near-identical smiles. Jack chuckles softly as he says to Bozer, "Make sure Peters knows not to say anything about that, and wipe the camera footage, okay?"

Bozer's voice is tinny as it comes through the phone speakers, but still unmistakably impressed and proud. "You got it. And Mac, just so you know, I feel pretty much the exact same way as Riley on this matter."

He hangs up before Mac has a chance to respond, which might be best, Jack decides, watching as the back of Mac's neck and the tips of his ears flush red, the younger man obviously embarrassed by his friends' spoken admiration of him. The kid's never been comfortable with being the center of attention, but, well, in this case he's just going to have to deal with it.

Quietly, Jack reaches out and ruffles the kid's hair,making it stick up even more than it already is. He's angry at the situation, yes, but it could've been worse- it could've been _so much worse_. Donnie's going to be punished, and Mac's safe now.

Quietly, as he notices the kid's eyes start to droop as his next dose of pain meds start to kick in, Jack says, "I agree with them too, kid."

The corner of Mac's mouth tilts up, just enough to show Jack that he heard him. That's enough for Jack, and he settles into the chair to wait until Mac wakes again.


End file.
